A Day Of Reckoning
by FuckMePumps
Summary: Weeks after his last rendezvous with the People, Artemis ponders on the path he'll take next. World's youngest criminal mastermind, or normal teenager and loving son? Oneshot. Please R&R!


**Author's Note:** First Arty fic! Woohoo!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Artemis Fowl… if I did, I would earn a living as a look-alike to Rowan Atkinson, besides being at book-signing events for my bestselling novel.

**-**

**_I have spoke with the tongue of angels  
I have held the hand of a devil  
It was warm in the night  
I was cold as a stone_**

But I still haven't found what I'm looking for  
But I still haven't found what I'm looking for

I believe in the kingdom come  
Then all the colors will bleed into one  
Bleed into one  
Well, yes I'm still running…

_**-I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For, By U2**_

**-_  
_**

Artemis felt a bead of sweat trickle down his back and immediately regretted his fashion choice for the day. His parents had urged him to dress into something more comfortable, like those repulsive normal teenager clothing, but with Artemis being Artemis, he had yet to lose his stubborn nature.

"_Come on, Arty. You're always so grown up. Take off that suit at once. It's too warm a day to be wearing those." Angeline Fowl coaxed her son as she hand-combed her hair._

_Artemis noticed the sun outside the window, burning bright and fierce. He would perspire all the fluid out of his body if he wore what he was wearing now. He almost agreed when his resolve came creeping back up in his mind._

'_You are Artemis Fowl. You make your own decisions,' it said._

"_No, Mother, I am fine."_

_Angeline looked crestfallen for a moment, then regained her big smile. She had always been happier since her husband came back, and she had tried to understand that her little Arty was a teenager now, so she never let anything dampen her spirits. She had given him his privacy, trying to be a good mom. He realized he didn't her much credit._

_Artemis shrugged off his suit jacket and rolled up the long sleeves of his button-up shirt until it reached his elbows. He tried to grin at his mother without scaring her._

_She just looked at him and laughed heartily. Artemis felt his own grin widen._

He recalled the incident that had happened only minutes ago and couldn't deny that he had in fact changed. Ever since his last rendezvous with the People two weeks ago, and when he anonymously donated _The Fairy Thief _to the Louvre, he felt different. Refreshed, cleansed, a whole new person.

Okay, not exactly. There was still that whole 'criminal genius mastermind' to work out. But he was working on it. Honestly.

The sun shone extra brightly in his eyes, making him look down. He kicked a small, smooth-looking stone in front of him as he walked along, wondering why he had agreed to roam the grounds on such a hot day. And a school day too. But his parents signed a permission slip for him to miss school, just this once. But it didn't make much of a difference. The cool breeze that used to be so revitalizing had turned into a dry, humid, lingering air that made him sweatier than ever. He squinted at his parents, who were a few yards ahead of him. From here he could hear them laugh, see the relaxed position their bodies were in… they were happy. He remembered. That's why.

He'd wanted to make them happy, to be a better son. He thought he could do that a lot more if he stayed at home. But despite his excellent grades and very, very high I.Q., they had still wanted him to continue his schooling.

"_But Mother, Father, I don't need to go back to St. Bartleby's! You can hire a private tutor… or something. There is absolutely nothing I could learn there." Artemis argued._

"_That's night the point, Artemis." Artemis Sr. shook his head._

"_Your father is right. You have never given St. Bartleby's a chance. We love you, Arty, We only want what's best for you. We just want you to be happy." His mother continued._

_The young heir was not deterred. "I know, mother. But I have given it a chance! I know more about the world than all the instructors there combined!" He blurted out._

_A long, frosty silence hung over them as his parent's caught each other's glances. They sighed at the exact same time._

"_We know, Arty." They said simultaneously. Artemis saw the weariness in their eyes and wondered how long it's been there. They were his parents, true, but he never felt like he really knew them…_

"_We know you're a hundred times more brilliant than all the teachers there, Artemis. Of course we know. But there's another thing than you can only get while you're there." Angeline continued._

"_We want you to make friends. We have read your Social and Personal development report and we feel that… you are a little bit lacking in the friends department." Artemis Sr. kneaded his forehead._

"_But I do have friends! Butler and Juliet and Holly…" Artemis trailed off before he could say any more._

_A small smile lit up his mother's face. "Oh, so you've met a girl? Where?"_

"_Oh, I meant… I… I mean, but the point is, I do have friends."_

_Angeline sighed deeply. Artemis thought she looked impatient. "I meant, friends that are your age. Young people you can talk to, someone you can relate with."_

_Artemis thought up a sufficient lie almost instantaneously. He is a genius, after all. "But I have made friends, Mother. At school. A boy named Greg."_

_He didn't bother to mention that Greg was the annoying boy who pestered him to help with his Mathematics. Does that count?_

_Artemis Sr. put a hand on his son's shoulder. He had cheered up a little bit. "It's a start."_

Artemis regretted that lie. If he could have started all over again, he'd probably leave the criminal mastermind business alone and just focus on his inactive social life and making his parents happy. But he couldn't. Now he really wanted to build that time machine…

He focused his tired eyes on the grassy ground. Green is good for the eyes, they say. And Artemis had conducted tests to prove it too. But the green only made him think of one thing: money.

He shook his head, as if that would literally shake the thoughts off. He sighed, knowing resistance was futile. His conscience was acting up again.

He knew how to make them happy. He knew, all along, but he had a hard time doing it.

They wanted a different life for him than that which he had already set up for himself.

Normal teenager. Can he do it?

Give up all his illegal activities to hang out with friends?

Abandon his ties to so many business empires to be like an average person?

Can Artemis Fowl, boy genius, criminal mastermind, give up everything he lived for, living like… someone else?

"_We love you, Arty, We only want what's best for you. We just want you to be happy."_

Would living like someone else make him happy?

Perhaps, but it was his nature to isolate himself, to dedicate himself to scientific experiments, and to prove others wrong. It was in his heart to be Artemis, it was _him_.

Would it make his parents happy if he stopped being like himself?

In short, would he trying so hard to make them happy actually make them happy?

Artemis thought up a very strange thing: he didn't know.

For once in his life, he didn't know the answer.

He shrugged off the interrogative and smirked his typical Artemis smirk.

Then he did something very un-Artemis like.

He ran forward, for once not caring if his Italian-bought loafers would get dirty, if his legs would give out, if sweat making his shirt damp made him look unprofessional.

_He didn't care._

He caught up with his parents and hugged both of them.

Angeline and Artemis Sr. was a bit surprised, but they only embraced their son back.

In that moment, the world faded away, his mind was blank, and Artemis only knew that he was surrounded by people he loved, who loved him too, and then and there the Fowls could have been mistaken for an average Irish family.

Anyways, it's a start.

**Author's Note:** Um… yeah. I hope I didn't make Artemis too OOC there, just got on a different side of our favorite youngest criminal mastermind in history… I think. Anyways, there goes my first Arty fic… so please, please click that cute little purple button over there and

REVIEW!

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